December 2012 | Page 9 of 22 | Zagsblog
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Adam Zagoria covers basketball at all levels. He is the author of two books and an award-winning journalist whose articles have appeared in ESPN The Magazine, SLAM, Sheridan Hoops, Sports Illustrated, Basketball Times and in newspapers nationwide.
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Tuesday / April 30.
  • Jabari Parker, one of the most talented and complete high school players in recent memory, will come off the board today and make one college program and its fan base very happy.

    The 6-foot-8 Parker out of Chicago Simeon will announce at 4 p.m. ET on ESPNU and the smart money has always been on Duke or Michigan State.

    He is also considering Florida, BYU and Stanford.

    The Chicago Sun-Times conducted a poll of 16 analysts and 13 predicted Duke with three predicting Michigan State.

    Myck Kabongo’s impending year-long suspension for accepting impermissible benefits will hurt him “big-time” in the upcoming NBA Draft, a veteran NBA scout told SNY.tv.

    “It hurts him big-time,” the scout said. “He played out of control last year. Most teams need to see him play five-on-five, running his team….His stock goes down.”

    As of this writing, DraftExpress.com has the 6-foot-2 sophomore point guard from Texas going with the 31st overall pick, or first in the second round.

    Asked what will happen to his draft status, Jonathan Givony of Draft Express told SNY.tv: “Depends what he decides to do between now and the draft. After his poor freshman season scouts needed to see how much he improves as a sophomore. I don’t think he’s shown enough to be considered a definite first rounder based on upside alone. He’ll have to show more somewhere. Unfortunately I’m not sure the D-League is an option for him because he was already enrolled at Texas.”

    The news of Kabongo’s suspension was first reported by Yahoo! Sports and confirmed by a source with direct knowledge of the case, who said the announcement will come online on the NCAA site on Thursday.

    NEW YORK — Let’s face it. If the Knicks’ opponent Wednesday night was the Milwaukee Bucks or Sacramento Kings, Carmelo Anthony might not have risked his sprained left ankle and returned to the court.

    But when the opponent is the crosstown Brooklyn Nets, Anthony wanted to come back and make a statement.

    “We wanted to win,” Anthony said after returning from a two-game hiatus because of the injury to score a game-best 31 points in the Knicks’ 100-86 victory over the Nets at Madison Square Garden.

    “We was on our homecourt. At the end of the day these are statement games, it’s all big games, divisional games. Like I said they right across the bridge so these games definitely mean a lot to us.”

    Dakari Johnson has cut his list to three schools, according to reports.

    The 6-foot-11 Johnson — who recently reclassified to 2013 from 2014 — is down to Kentucky, Syracuse and Georgetown, according to Tweets from Dave Telep and Evan Daniels, who spoke with Johnson at the City of Palms Classic.

    Johnson made the announcement to reporters after going for 23 points on 11-for-11 shooting with 10 rebounds as Montverde (Fla.) Academy rolled Fort Myers Bishop Verot, 79-35.

    He had previously been considering Kansas, Ohio State and Florida, while Missouri had recently offered.

    In an interview last month with SNY.tv, Makini Campbell, Johnson’s mother, talked about Kentucky’s attraction because the family lived in Lexington for several years while Johnson was in middle school.

    “Actually, last Thanksgiving we spent time with his friends there, with his extended family,” she said. “So for him that is kind of like going back to something that ‘s very familiar and something that is likable.

    GREENBURGH, N.Y. — Carmelo Anthony remains a gametime decision for tonight’s Nets game, when the Knicks could be very short-handed against their intra-city rivals.

    Rasheed Wallace and Marcus Camby are both out (sore feet) and Steve Novak (flu like symptoms) is questionable.

    “It’s a gametime decision [on Anthony],” Knicks coach Mike Woodson said after shootaround. “I mean, he’s moving around pretty good so we’ll see.”

    He added: “He still hasn’t indicated that he’s going to play…I think he’s going to come out and warm up and see how he feels.”

    McCullough CuseSyracuse-bound Chris McCullough, one of the top power forwards in the Class of 2014 out of Brewster (N.H.) Academy and Team Scan, will be contributing periodically to ZAGSBLOG this season. Here’s his first entry:

    What’s up, world? Hope all is well. I’m Chris McCullough and I am writing my first blog, so thanks in advance for reading.

    OK, so the last two months I have been playing real good basketball. I attend Brewster Academy. We have a very good, diverse squad this year with about eight Division I players. We are still trying to get good chemistry. We are now 9-4 although it is still early in the season and we are starting to pick it up.

    Last month was the early signing period. It was good to see all the seniors sign their Letters of Intent and send them back to their school. I thought to myself that one day, I would be doing the same thing.

    GREENBURGH, N.Y. — One day after scoring a career-high 29 points, Knicks rookie Chris Copeland was sent Tuesday to the Erie BayHawks of the D-League.

    Wearing a blue and white Knicks practice jersey, the 6-foot-8 Copeland joined Amar’e Stoudemire and James White (who was also assigned to Erie) in black BayHawks jerseys during a practice at the Knicks Westchester campus.

    But don’t expect Copeland — whom we featured in this story by Dan Kelly — to stay down for long.

    “He’s not going anywhere,” coach Mike Woodson said. “He’ll be back.”

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